Statements About the War Made By Our Party Before the Revolution

Published:PravdaNo. 56, May 26 (13), 1917.

      Published according to the text inPravda.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1964,

      Moscow,Volume 24,

      pages393-394.Translated:Isaacs BernardTranscription\Markup:B. BagginsandD. WaltersPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      1999

      (2005).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.

Thestatements dealing with the possible victory of a chauvinist
      (defencist) revolution are of particular
      interest.Sotsial-Demokrat, the Central Organ of the
      Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party published in Geneva under
      the editorship of Zinoviev and Lenin, carried the following
      statement of its editors in its issue No. 47 for October 13,
      1915:

“(8)Byrevolutionary chauvinists we mean those who want a
      victory over tsarism so as to achieve victory over Germany,
      plunder other countries, consolidate Great-Russian rule over the
      other peoples of Russia, etc. Revolutionary chauvinism is based
      on the class position of the petty bourgeoisie. The latter
      always vacillates between the bourgeoisie and the
      proletariat. At present it is vacillating between chauvinism
      (which prevents it from being consistently revolutionary, even
      within the meaning of a democratic revolution) and proletarian
      internationalism. At the moment the Trudoviks, the
      Socialist-Revolutionaries,Nasha
      Zarya,[2]Chkheidze’s
      Duma
group,[3]the Organising Committee, Mr. Plekhanov and the
      like are political spokesmen for this petty bourgeoisie in
      Russia.

“(9)Ifthe revolutionary chauvinists won in Russia, we would be
      opposed to a defence oftheir‘fatherland’ in the
      present war. Our slogan is: against the chauvinists, even if
      they are revolutionary end republican—against them, andforan alliance of the international proletariat for
      the socialist revolution.

“(10)Tothe question of whether it is possible for the
      proletariat to assume the leadership in the bourgeois Russian
      revolution, our answer is: yes, it is possible,ifthe
      pettybourgeoisie swings to the left at the decisive moment; it
      is being pushed to the left, not only by our propaganda, but by
      a number of objective factors, economic, financial (the burden
      of war), military, political, and others.

“(11)Tothe question of what the party of the proletariat would
      do if the revolution placed power in its hands in the present
      war, our answer is as follows: we would propose peace toallthe belligerents on the condition that freedom is
      given to the colonies andallpeoples that are
      dependent, oppressed and deprived of rights. Under the present
      governments, neither Germany nor Britain and France would accept
      this condition. In that case, we would have to prepare for and
      wage a revolutionary war, i.e., not only resolutely carry out
      the whole of our minimum programme, but work systematically to
      bring about an uprising among all peoples now oppressed by the
      Great Russians, all colonies and dependent countries in Asia
      (India, China, Persia, etc.), and also, first and foremost, we
      would raise up the socialist proletariat of Europe for an
      insurrection against their governments and despite the
      social-chauvinists. There is no doubt that a victory of the
      proletariat in Russia would create extraordinarily favourable
      conditions for the development of the revolution in both Asia
      and Europe.Even1905 proved that. The international
      solidarity of the revolutionary proletariat is afact,
      despite the scum of opportunism and
social-chauvinism.”[1]

[1]Seepresent edition, Vol. 21, pp. 403–04.—Ed.

[2][PLACEHOLDER.]

[3][PLACEHOLDER.]